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Prometheus 360

I talked about Odysseus recently and said that it was part of a new topic that I’m going to address, the topic of myths. Why myths? First because they captured human thoughts, visions of the world and of human fate, just like an aerial captures the radio waves out there. Strangely, in those ancient times, the waves these aerials capture are so profound and still amazingly relevant. And what did the myths do with the thoughts they captured? Well, they relaid them, or cascaded them further throughout our history, so that many people and artists have come back to them again and again. So what they did in fact, is they supplied models for us, like glasses to use when looking around. We somehow see people in terms of types, like the Bruce Willis type, the George Bush type, and we see our experiences in terms of types, like the beach holiday romance, the high school crush, or the happy ending. Well, behind many of these types there are very few true archetypes, or original models, just as one chromosome is responsible for the billions of men, or of women, in our world. And these chromosomes of our experience are the myths.

So after Odysseus, another powerful myth and another tremendous figure – Prometheus. In fact, even more than Odysseus, he is the absolute super-hero.

Watch my presentation to see how I link Prometheus to creation myths, to tragic mythical heroes, or to regard Prometheus from a perspective of philosophy (what kind of thing is he?), of art (what sides of his personality have been transposed), of social history (authority versus rebellion, legality versus lawfulness etc).

In a short presentation I have tried to provide a quick 360-degree view of this great hero, of this multi-faceted story. There are just so many aspects that can be selected for further reflection.

A link to my sources, where you might also want to start if you wish to read more, is here:Prometheus sources